| Biographical Non-Fiction posted July 17, 2022 |
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How I was formed with stick and carrot
A Tale of Two Teachers
by Fleedleflump
More moons ago than the night remembers, I was doing A-levels at school (for non-UK readers, these are optional additional qualifications for 16-18 year-olds, designed to bridge the gap between secondary school and university). Not surprisingly, I’d opted to do English Literature, and had rebelled by not taking Maths, despite strong urging. I’d also chosen History (mistake) and ‘Government and Politics’ but those aren’t what I’m writing about here.
Aside - Bear in mind, I went to an all-boys school. My Government and Politics teacher gave out several text books during the two years, but the ones most referenced were written by somebody called Dennis Cox. At the start of every lesson, without fail, our teacher would grin and say, “Okay, I need you all to get your Cox out.” He’d probably be in more trouble for that joke, these days.
He also said no government would ever be foolish enough to hold a referendum on our place in Europe, because although everyone in government knew it was a good idea to be part of the European Economic Community (EEC, as it was then), people would still vote to leave. A little over twenty years later, I bet many of our government advisors were thinking the same thing.
So there I was, with two years of English ahead of me, and two different teachers to contend with. One became my favourite teacher, the other almost killed my interest in writing entirely. I’ll let you decide which was which.
We were studying the poetry of Seamus Heaney, specifically his Bog poems. He was my teacher’s favourite poet. As we drew to the end, I wrote a detailed analysis of the series of poems, but also shared my frustration at their particularly opaque language (even by Heaney’s standards). I wrote a line saying that perhaps, if he sought to convey a specific meaning, he should make it clearer. I got an F for that, and a suggestion that if I wanted simple language, I should go back to reading Rosie and Jim.
In my other class, we were reading Chaucer, which whilst frustrating at times (if only we could still change the spellings of words to meet the rhyme and meter we’d prefer!), we were encouraged to look for things implied rather than said. We also had an assignment to write our own entry in the Canterbury Tales, trying to emulate Middle English. If we came up with an interpretation (with solid justification) that our teacher hadn’t seen before, he’d scribble ‘piglet idea!’ in the margin, and take a photocopy to keep in his notes for future classes.
I could go on, but I don’t want to bore you! It’s fair to say both my English teachers affected me, and perhaps they both helped hone my sarcasm. To this day, I can feel their influence in my writing.
Look out for my forthcoming poetry series on bogs. You won’t have any idea what I’m going on about!
Teaching Affected Me contest entry
More moons ago than the night remembers, I was doing A-levels at school (for non-UK readers, these are optional additional qualifications for 16-18 year-olds, designed to bridge the gap between secondary school and university). Not surprisingly, I’d opted to do English Literature, and had rebelled by not taking Maths, despite strong urging. I’d also chosen History (mistake) and ‘Government and Politics’ but those aren’t what I’m writing about here.
Aside - Bear in mind, I went to an all-boys school. My Government and Politics teacher gave out several text books during the two years, but the ones most referenced were written by somebody called Dennis Cox. At the start of every lesson, without fail, our teacher would grin and say, “Okay, I need you all to get your Cox out.” He’d probably be in more trouble for that joke, these days.
He also said no government would ever be foolish enough to hold a referendum on our place in Europe, because although everyone in government knew it was a good idea to be part of the European Economic Community (EEC, as it was then), people would still vote to leave. A little over twenty years later, I bet many of our government advisors were thinking the same thing.
So there I was, with two years of English ahead of me, and two different teachers to contend with. One became my favourite teacher, the other almost killed my interest in writing entirely. I’ll let you decide which was which.
We were studying the poetry of Seamus Heaney, specifically his Bog poems. He was my teacher’s favourite poet. As we drew to the end, I wrote a detailed analysis of the series of poems, but also shared my frustration at their particularly opaque language (even by Heaney’s standards). I wrote a line saying that perhaps, if he sought to convey a specific meaning, he should make it clearer. I got an F for that, and a suggestion that if I wanted simple language, I should go back to reading Rosie and Jim.
In my other class, we were reading Chaucer, which whilst frustrating at times (if only we could still change the spellings of words to meet the rhyme and meter we’d prefer!), we were encouraged to look for things implied rather than said. We also had an assignment to write our own entry in the Canterbury Tales, trying to emulate Middle English. If we came up with an interpretation (with solid justification) that our teacher hadn’t seen before, he’d scribble ‘piglet idea!’ in the margin, and take a photocopy to keep in his notes for future classes.
I could go on, but I don’t want to bore you! It’s fair to say both my English teachers affected me, and perhaps they both helped hone my sarcasm. To this day, I can feel their influence in my writing.
Look out for my forthcoming poetry series on bogs. You won’t have any idea what I’m going on about!
Aside - Bear in mind, I went to an all-boys school. My Government and Politics teacher gave out several text books during the two years, but the ones most referenced were written by somebody called Dennis Cox. At the start of every lesson, without fail, our teacher would grin and say, “Okay, I need you all to get your Cox out.” He’d probably be in more trouble for that joke, these days.
He also said no government would ever be foolish enough to hold a referendum on our place in Europe, because although everyone in government knew it was a good idea to be part of the European Economic Community (EEC, as it was then), people would still vote to leave. A little over twenty years later, I bet many of our government advisors were thinking the same thing.
So there I was, with two years of English ahead of me, and two different teachers to contend with. One became my favourite teacher, the other almost killed my interest in writing entirely. I’ll let you decide which was which.
We were studying the poetry of Seamus Heaney, specifically his Bog poems. He was my teacher’s favourite poet. As we drew to the end, I wrote a detailed analysis of the series of poems, but also shared my frustration at their particularly opaque language (even by Heaney’s standards). I wrote a line saying that perhaps, if he sought to convey a specific meaning, he should make it clearer. I got an F for that, and a suggestion that if I wanted simple language, I should go back to reading Rosie and Jim.
In my other class, we were reading Chaucer, which whilst frustrating at times (if only we could still change the spellings of words to meet the rhyme and meter we’d prefer!), we were encouraged to look for things implied rather than said. We also had an assignment to write our own entry in the Canterbury Tales, trying to emulate Middle English. If we came up with an interpretation (with solid justification) that our teacher hadn’t seen before, he’d scribble ‘piglet idea!’ in the margin, and take a photocopy to keep in his notes for future classes.
I could go on, but I don’t want to bore you! It’s fair to say both my English teachers affected me, and perhaps they both helped hone my sarcasm. To this day, I can feel their influence in my writing.
Look out for my forthcoming poetry series on bogs. You won’t have any idea what I’m going on about!
 Recognized |
There are so many more examples I could give, but these are my favourites.
Mike
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and 2 member cents. Mike
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